//------------------------------// // 7 - Cannon Fire, it is more blessed to give than to receive… // Story: Pegasus: Eos Typhoon // by Jatheus //------------------------------// Eos Typhoon had taken up a position with her gun crews, and now they waited for the gliders to begin launching before they opened up a barrage on the airships. It would be nearly impossible to score a kill in the opening moments of the battle, but every shot had to count. She stared through the binocular scope affixed to her large mounted rifle, watching the deck crew on the left airship. They seemed at relative ease, though they were clearly on alert. They must have known about the munitions depot, but they didn’t seem certain that anybody was home. Still, they manned their posts, and several of the large white apes used telescopes to scan the rock face for anything amiss. Several times, she had seen them scan right across her position, and each time, the fur on the nape of her neck stood on end. Every time they continued on, not having noticed the cannon emplacement for the way sunlight played on the cliff face, keeping them in shadow. She guessed the range at eight-hundred yards or more. It wasn’t impossible by any means, but with unknown wind conditions, and uncertainty of distance, her first shot would be her calibration. After that, she should be able to start picking off officers and gunners one by one. ‘Patience,’ she told herself. ‘You’ll get them soon.’ She began sweating, the anticipation making her tongue thick as she waited. It was like an itch that she couldn’t quite reach, begging for relief. ‘Soon, Clipper. Soon.’ Then a minor commotion began on the airship. Several of the apes were pointing, shouting. It was time. Eos looked away from the binoculars for just a moment to confirm that the first two gliders were already in the air. As they took up arms, pointing them in the direction of her comrades, Eos Typhoon unconsciously pushed her hair to cover her missing ear before putting her eyes back to the binocular scope. She sucked in a final heavy breath, her heart pounding, ready to burst. She held it a moment, centering her crosshairs on the chest of an enemy. Her breath eased out as she squeezed the trigger. Her rifle exploded to life, heaving back against her, though the restraints on which it was mounted absorbed most of the recoil. The scope steadied in time for her to see the impact of her shot. It struck down and left. Aiming up and right, she mechanically cycled the action on the rifle and squeezed the trigger again as the other three guns and the cannons also flared to life. Her chosen target fell out of sight. She chose another, one that was shouting orders. Her heart became a drum, pounding in lethal rhythm even louder in her ears than the cannon fire that was erupting all around her. She dropped her second target with a single shot. A smile contorted her face, the thrill of the hunt swelling within her. As she chose a third victim, her vision was obscured by a smoke round, fired from her own cannons. As theirs was a static position, the few extra seconds concealing their location would no doubt be put to good use. True, it would be difficult for them to see the airships through the smokescreen, but the bags were large targets, and that was the primary objective. As she couldn’t be sure of another kill on the deck, she aimed up slightly and fired toward the bag. She wasn’t totally sure that her rifle round would do sufficient damage to bring it down. The Storm had been using airships in combat for some time, and they had a knack for repairing small holes. By what mechanism they accomplished this, Eos Typhoon did not know. She redirected her attention to the right airship. It was less obscured by the smokescreen, and it was taking fire from both cannons and the other rifles as well. This was a mutual sentiment, as the broad side of the airship opened up their own bombardment moments later. A series of cracks like thunderbolts broke against the cliffs near the position of the cannons, far too close for Eos’ liking. The seemingly immovable stone around her shuddered under the assault. Between the respective roar of incoming and outgoing fire, the pegasus could effectively not hear anything by this point. However, she surely did feel it when a bullet struck one of the lenses of her binocular scope. Eos Typhoon fell backward from the impact as the front end of the scope exploded, shards of glass spraying in all directions. She stumbled and landed on her posterior, the stone floor sending its own jolt of pain through her body. As she scrambled back to her position, she caught sight of another pegasus who shouted to her, “You okay?” “Yeah!” she shouted back, using the remaining half of the scope to aim and fire. This time, the impact was level and far right, the scope having been knocked out of alignment. She corrected for this and scored another hit. The next victim she chose had the fortune of moving as she pulled the trigger. No doubt he felt the bullet zip by his head and ducked reflexively. The bolt came back, the empty clip springing out of the breech, signaling that she had fired all of the loaded rounds. Eos Typhoon was going to shout for a reload, but her attentive comrade was already jamming another clip into the breech. With a nod, she worked the bolt and searched for a target. She took aim for another sharpshooter that was looking directly at her when the staggered impact began of a full broadside from both airships. Eos instinctively dropped to the stone floor, covered her head, and began counting. It should be a few seconds, as the airships would fire each cannon in turn to maintain greater stability. Shards of shattered rock rained down from all directions, pelting the mare and compelling her to stay down. The air was soon thick with gunpowder and chalky smoke of broken stone, the roar of echoing explosions and unmistakable scent of blood and viscera. Feeling a cold sweat on her brow, Eos Typhoon came up to find that her rifle had been sheered off and was gone. It gave her pause that she’d been that close to her own end. That thought was redoubled when she noticed that the soldier who had reloaded for her was as felled as her mounted rifle, his boots being all that were left still recognizable amidst the stain on the floor and back walls. Caught between fright and sickness, Eos composed herself as she assessed their situation. Another of their number lay screaming with a severe wound through her abdomen. It was likely that they would not survive many more such fusillades, but as long as they had working guns, they needed to help keep fire away from the gliders. “Focus fire on the right bag!” she shouted. The gunners went back to work as Eos stopped to render aid to the badly wounded soldier. She deployed clotting agents from her medical pack and got a rudimentary bandage in place. She doubted whether it would be any use, but she had to try. She couldn’t bear the thought of just giving up on one of her own that was still breathing, if for no other reason than the perhaps insignificant value of her presence to give them hope. In no shape to fight, Eos Typhoon drug the wounded mare back into the stone structure. Unceremoniously, she left her there and charged back down to the cannons. Sniper fire dropped one of her cannoneers. He was dead. Another volley of cannon fire from the airships compelled the survivors to duck and pray. Eos Typhoon’s heart banged even louder than the concussion of the incoming fire. For a moment she could see through the smoke as the battle unfolded. At least one glider was making a run for it. Three others were converging on the left airship, attempting to ram it. Sharpshooters covered the decks of both airships, targeting gliders and the defensive cannons wedged in the rocks. One of the gliders exploded from an expertly aimed cannon shot that tore through the fuselage. There was no sign of the pilot. Another glider took heavy amounts of small arms fire and turned lazily as though out of control. The pilot from the final one leapt and dove straight down to a safer position. The airship engaged their propellers at full speed to evade the glider, which caught a gust of wind and impacted into the vertical stabilizer and rudder. Metal crunched as the glider crumpled like a tin can, wrecking the airship’s ability to steer. The partially disabled airship’s gunners wasted no time concentrating fire on the second wave of gliders that were working their way to the right airship. Eos Typhoon’s gunners were back up, pouring hot lead toward the right airship as fast as they could reload. Unexpectedly, their right cannon went silent. Eos charged over to it. “It’s jammed!” the operator shouted. His reloader was working to clear it when she was struck by a rifle round. Her head rocked sickly to one side as she fell, not even having had time to realize that she’d been shot before she was dead. This was no place to die. Eos lifted the body of the fallen mare and used her as a shield as she worked to clear the jam, a difficult task in ideal conditions and doubly so under fire and encumbered. “I’m not dying here, no fracking way!” Eos Typhoon shouted into the air as she cleared the jam. She stumbled backward as a rifle round struck the body she carried. She fell under it, unable to be certain whether she was wounded at first. The cannon roared to life, a grin on the gunner’s face. Eos looked up in time to see the center of the bag on the airship burst as the perfectly aimed shot ripped through it. The right airship immediately began losing altitude, and every gun onboard aimed at the source of their demise. There wasn’t time to run, or do much of anything else. Everyone who was on a rifle or cannon traded fire with the crippled airship. Eos again ducked, this time behind the body she was still under. She was vaguely aware of the impact as she saw stars for a moment, but everything was dark and quiet after that. Grit in her eyes was the first thing that Eos Typhoon noticed. Why was there always grit? Next a loud ringing in her ears overcame the silence. Sluggish, dull sensation returned to her limbs. She feebly tried to wipe the grit from her eyes, but her motions were slow and clumsy. All she could see was a light blur, and it hurt too much to try. Then her memory caught up. The battle. She had to move. Redoubling her efforts, the mare cleared the grit from her eyes. About that time, she felt a hoof on her shoulder. She looked up at one of her cannoneers. He was trying to talk, but she couldn’t hear anything but the ringing yet. He tried again, yelling more slowly and she read his lips. “We have to go!” Eos Typhoon struggled to stand, making it up onto her hooves. The entire area was wrecked with the remains of the guns and soldiers who had been operating them. She could just make it out through the smoke, how the twisted remains of pony and rock lay mixed on top of each other. The other survivor, a stallion named Vortex, was completely gray from the rock dust that covered his normally deep purple coat. The pair helped each other to the exit, finding it partially collapsed but passable if they crawled one at a time. On the other side, Eos found the body of the previously wounded soldier she had drug out. It seemed that blood loss had claimed her. The two continued on, making their way back to the hangar. The ground rumbled and shook beneath their faltering hooves as they ran, using each other for support.